


Two Tigers Cannot Live on One Mountain

by Slippery Kick (AceQueenKing)



Category: Tekken
Genre: Character Study, F/M, Family Issues, Gen, Mother-Son Relationship, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2017-10-27
Packaged: 2019-01-21 14:34:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12459798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/Slippery%20Kick
Summary: Kazumi has always had an affinity for dangerous things. Tigers, guns, Heihachi, her son - they all feel right in her hands, molded by her second selves' power.





	Two Tigers Cannot Live on One Mountain

1\. She is  Hachijo Kazumi, but not only Hachijo Kazumi. There is a second her, a second-self, that wears her body like a skin and snakes in and out of her consciousness.

It has been with her for as long as she can remember.

She can catch bits of its thoughts at times - power, lust, glory - and she tucks that part of herself away, keeps it hidden. She is the first of her kind, the first woman to carry her bloodline's most potent secret in centuries.

She is an outlier in many ways. It is not proper to have such thoughts for a woman of her station in Japan. She is already painfully aware of the gossip on her in all of Heihachi's fanciest parties; a woman as deadly as her husband in any dojo, the hidden tiger pacing in the great halls on Honmaru.

She has always had an affinity for dangerous things. Tigers, guns, Heihachi - they all feel right in her hands, molded by her second selves' power. There is something about destruction and creation that makes her feel alive, feel right. She itches in the long post-war peace and longs for the imperial armies of her father's age. Even if she cannot participate directly, she feeds off of it; the need for power, for control.

It is everything to her - greater than love, than respect, than money. It is why she is here, in the hall of the house of Mishima - it is why she agrees to marry Heihachi.

She is a wolf, clad in sheepskins. She plays demure and Jinpachi and Heihachi both eat it up; soon she is pregnant, and soon, she has a son.

When she gives birth to a son, she knows that he will be her crowning glory, a sun burning so bright that he can blind the entire world.

A son unhampered by the ties that bind her; her role as a woman and a warrior, her father's name.

\- - -

2\. She is Mishima Kazumi, but not only Mishima Kazumi. She is a fighter, a mother, a demon, an angel - all these things and more, depending on who looks at her.

Of all those who turn their gaze upon her, her son is by far her favorite. He is her heart's blood; they are inseparable, mother and son, demoness and demonspawn. He toddles behind her every step.

"Look ka-san, look!" Kazuya says, lifting his arms in an imitation of her own kata. She claps and applauds, then echoes the performance, the rhythmic one-two-three of the light punches echoing in the air. He practices with her and together, they are one creature, moving in one glorious movement through a kata older than all but their second-selves.

Heihachi scoffs from a far corner. "Arms up, boy! Mishimas are not sloppy!" He sneers, and she glares at him, mama cat sensibilities coming to roost. Her second self whispers _he is jealous_ ; he has always longed for a son who shared in his blood. Kazuya is not this son, not really; he is a cuckoo, roosting in the house of an old enemy, growing strong on the Mishima's teat. She places a hand on her son's shoulder, mouth drawn into a thin line.

 _Let me have him,_ the second-self slithers. _Let me eat him up._

Not yet, she says, and places a hand on her son. Heihachi is a fool but he is a beloved one, and strong enough to shelter her and Kazuya both from any suspicions. The Hachijo are an old family, a family that does not forget that any supernatural power comes at the price of a mob's pitchforks targetted squarely on them.

This, at least, is a domestic squabble. Understandable. The doddering servant cowering in the corner, trying to clean some of the many ornate statues while not drawing attention to himself, probably thinks of her only a suffering wife. It beats the alternative, she knows. Society is not forgiving to powerful women.

Heihachi storms toward them, and she folds Kazuya closer into her skirts. "Heihachi-kun..." She says, but he waves her off with an impatient arm.

He does not apologize to her, ignoring her glare and, instead, kneeling. The father stares at the son for a moment, and Kazuya stares down his father, bold already, a hunter stalking its prey. Heihachi yanks at Kazuya's arms. She does not protest this barbaric treatment; instead, she watches her son's eyes with interest, and waits to see what he will reveal - stone cold Mishima eyes, black and deep as still water? It is what Heihachi would prefer, she knows.

But instead, Kazuya's eyes are bright, piercing, angry. In her son, she sees the Hachijo rage that burns bright, the demon in their shared blood howling.

She places a hand on his back to cool him, and her second self thinks - _someday, we won't need your father anymore_. The boy looks up at her and Heihachi wrenches Kazuya's face forward. "Look at me, boy!" he barks.

Kazuya, still a toddler, does not flinch. Kazuya, her tiger-cub, looks into his father's eyes and she feels his blood ignite; his rage is she feels in her own veins.

"Heihachi-kun," she says, voice sickeningly sweet. It's enough to make him look up, to look at her, to distract him from the boy. "That is enough for today. Let us get lunch, shall we?"

He looks at her with a soft smile, still enchanted by her. She wonders how long it will last. Her secret self tries to warn her, whispers that men like Heihachi never have interest in strong women beyond their conquest. _Someday, being a pretty girl won't be enough, and you will have to take out your claws._

Protective, she closes an arm around her son and feels the red tips of her fingers prick into the young boy's skin.

No matter what, they will be enough.

She will teach him, and he will grow; one day, she will introduce him to her second-self, awaken the power within him.

But for now, she closes the door to the dojo, leaving all the heavy emotions - love, hate, subterfuge, frustration - for another day.

They will have time, she thinks. Her second self whispers something in her ear, half-poison and half-warning, but she can't make sense of it, and Kazuya tugging at her skirts distracts her.

She gathers him in her arms, and together, the tigers stalk their prey as Heihachi struts toward the Mishima compound.


End file.
